THE BEYOND

Cult of Luna's The Beyond takes a lot from the early Isis music. It's thick, heavy doom metal, and it stays that way for a long time. OK, we see some dynamics here and there, but for the vast majority of this disc, we are dealt astoundingly heavy music. And, possibly more astounding than the sheer heaviness is that this album is 74 minutes long! That is just too much, guys. Music like this is just not enough to sustain the listner for so much time. It's good music, and certainly better than Cult of Luna's doom metal peers, but I'm sure we can all agree that they didn't get it all together on this one. With their next release, however, the band shows huge growth as musicians and composers, and that's really where you should turn your attention. Fans of doom metal, look no further, or maybe a little further but not too much. Fans of awesome music, look at the next two albums.